MMC chief Dr Vinky Rughwani conferred IAP’s Social Champion award 2025
Mumbai, 22nd January 2026: Maharashtra Medical Council’s chief and well-known paediatrician Dr Vinky Rughwani was presented with the social champion award for the year 2025 on Saturday by the Indian Academy of Paediatricians. This honour was conferred upon him for the work he has been doing for the patients of genetic blood disorders thalassemia and sickle cell disease.
The award was presented during the annual conference of the Indian Academy of Paediatricians, the apex body of paediatricians in the country with almost 50,000 memebers from across the country. During their annual conference called Pedicon, the social champion award is given out to paediatricians who have excelled in medico-social work.
“Recieving this awars makes me feel even more motivated to continue the work for these kids. An added bonus of recieving this on the IAP stage will be that many more paediatricians will know the need for more work needed for the welfare of children suffering from genetic blood disorders,” he said.
For Dr Rughwani, the honour comes in the wake of his untiring efforts to advocate for improving the facilities available from the state government for thalassemia and sickle cell patients. His efforts have led to the government providing them free blood transfusions and iron chelation medicines, free travel in state transport buses and funding to the only cure for these diseases which is bone marrow transplantation. He is also the president of the NGO Thalassemia and Sickle Cell Society of India.
Dr Rughwnani has also been the chief of the Maharashtra Medical Council which enforces ethics and deals with grievances against the doctors since the last two years. During his tenure, he has taken steps to curb the number of quacks by asking doctors to display their MMC registration QR codes. He has also brought down the pendency in the number of unresolved grievance cases tremendously by holding hearings multiple days in a week.
